July 10, 2012 10:36 PM UTC

Romney Heads To Colorado Springs After All

•  
• by: Colorado Pols

Politico updates following Mitt Romney’s town hall in Grand Junction today:

Mitt Romney will make a stop in Colorado Springs to pitch in on relief efforts for the hundreds of families impacted by the Colorado wildfires.

“He’s going to Care and Share and packaging up goods for victims of the fires,” a campaign aide told reporters here in Grand Junction. “Our campaign went down a couple of weeks ago and volunteered.”

The campaign aide said that the Romney campaign’s victory offices throughout the state have also been collecting goods for the Salvation Army, also to benefit victims impacted by the wildfires.

Over the last few days, we’ve followed the lead-up to Romney’s campaign swing through Colorado–beginning with word last Thursday from FOX 31’s Eli Stokols that Romney was planning public events “focused on the wildfires that have been burning across the state.” This would have taken place in the context of recent attempts by local Republicans to blame President Barack Obama’s administration in some fashion for the devastation caused by these fires. That attempt to assign blame for the fires on the Obama administration came despite votes by Colorado Republican congressman to cut federal firefighting budgets by hundreds of millions of dollars–and after Romney himself disparaged Obama’s plans to hire “more firefighters.”

Well folks, it does appear that Romney’s campaign got the message, and is taking the high road that surrogates didn’t. Today’s town hall appearance by Romney in Grand Junction made no attempt to blame Obama for the wildfires, only commending the bravery of an individual who was injured and praising Colorado’s “spirit.” Likewise, a visit by Romney to a local charity to make care packages for displaced families before he leaves is a perfectly decent thing to do.

It would have been worse for Romney to have continued these attacks after himself having indirectly called for fewer public safety resources. Steering clear of that line of attack was smart, but it would still be nice to see a local reporter ask Romney if he really wants fewer firefighters in Colorado–something a no-press charity event rules out neatly.

Better luck next time; we’d say Colorado voters deserve an answer.